Helen

Helen was the wife of King Menelaus of Sparta whose elopement with Prince Paris of Troy in 1250 BC led to the ten-year Trojan War between the Achaean Greeks and the Trojans.

Biography
Helen was the daughter of Zeus and Leda, and Greek mythology states that Zeus conceived her while morphed into a swan, and that Helen was hatched from an egg. She was raised by Leda's husband, King Tyndareus of Sparta, and she was said to be the most beautiful woman in the world. As a young girl, she was abducted by Theseus, causing an invasion of Athens by Castor and Pollux, who forced Theseus to return her. In 1260 BC, Tyndareus had Helen presented to several Greek princes for marriage, and Odysseus made all of the princes swear to support whichever husband was chosen. Ultimately, King Menelaus was chosen as Helen's husband, and they were married for ten years; Helen bore Menelaus a daughter, Hermione. In 1250 BC, the Trojan prince Paris of Troy came to Sparta on a diplomatic mission, and the young and strapping Paris convinced Helen to desert her elderly husband and elope with him to Troy. Helen agreed, and her husband summoned the other Greek princes to fulfill their oaths and support him against his wife's abductors. During the ensuing Trojan War, Helen frequently sought to return herself to the Greeks to put an end to the bloodshed, but Hector persuaded her against doing so. Only Hector and King Priam were kind to her, as the rest of the Trojans despised her for her self-loathing and regret. After Paris' death, she remarried to Priam's other son Deiphobus, and she was recaptured by Menelaus during the Greek assault on the city in 1240 BC. She later reconciled with Menelaus and had a harmonious married life until her death of natural causes.